1. No category

Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
– Poverty, Inequality and the Potential of
International Human Rights Law
Margot E. Salomon
LSE Law, Society and Economy Working Papers 15/2010
London School of Economics and Political Science
Law Department
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Why Should it Matter that Others Have More? –
Poverty, Inequality and the Potential of International
Human Rights Law
Margot E. Salomon*
Abstract: A concern with ensuring minimum standards of dignity for all and a doctrine based
on the need to secure for everyone basic levels of rights have traditionally shaped the way in
which international human rights law addresses poverty. Whether this minimalist, nonrelational approach befits international law objectives in the area of world poverty begs
consideration. This paper offers three justifications as to why global material inequality – and
not just poverty – should matter to international human rights law. The paper then situates
requirements regarding the improvement of living conditions, a system of equitable
distribution in the case of hunger, and in particular obligations of international cooperation,
within the post-1945 international effort at people-centred development. The contextual
consideration of relevant tenets serves to demonstrate that positive international human rights
law can be applied beyond efforts at poverty alleviation to accommodate a doctrine of fair
global distribution.
Centre for the Study of Human Rights and Law Department, London School of Economics and
Political Science. [email protected]. An earlier version of this paper entitled ‘Affluence under
International Human Rights Law’ was presented in May 2009 at the International Law and Global Justice
Conference, Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford. Given the
multidisciplinary nature of the event and of this research project, I am especially grateful for the insights
and suggestions generously offered by conference participants and thank in this regard: Francis Cheneval,
Peter Dietsch, Katrin Flikschuh, Terry Nardin, Laura Valentini and Helga Varden. This work also
benefited from the expert reflections offered by Philip Alston and Robert Howse when presented in
March 2010 at the Institute for International Law and Justice and the Center for Human Rights and
Global Justice, New York University Law School. For his invaluable comments on a draft of this article
my sincere appreciation goes to Leif Wenar. As ever, responsibility for the views presented herein rests
solely with the author. The proceedings of the Oxford University conference will be published in the
Review of International Studies.
This work is dedicated to the life and memory of Professor Peter Townsend (1928–2009), an
irreplaceable colleague, friend and co-conspirator, and an indefatigable advocate of the rights of the poor.
His outstanding legacy offers some comfort, but he is missed terribly.
*
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INTRODUCTION
Poverty blights the lives of almost half the world population. Four point eight
billion people live in developing countries of which 2.7 billion, or 43 per cent of
the world population, live on less than USD two a day.1 One in four people (1.4
billion) in the developing world live in extreme poverty attempting to survive
below the international poverty line of USD 1.25 a day.2 If we take China out of
the picture in order to get a sense of the generalised trend, the number of people
globally living in extreme poverty has increased in the past three decades.3
Moreover, recent findings challenge the oft-advanced conclusion that world
poverty has fallen substantially since the early 1990s due to a decrease in poverty
in China and India.4 So world poverty may be down, but if so it is largely due to
poverty reduction figures in a very small number of populous countries. Then
again world poverty may not be falling at all.
International human rights law is undoubtedly alive to the poverty that
continues to plague this half of humanity.5 Socio-economic rights are concerned
with ensuring minimum subsistence requirements and standards of basic dignity.6
Given its preoccupation with people who are left out, discriminated against, and
marginalised, it is perhaps not surprising that human rights concerns around
poverty are approached with a focus on the poor, not on the affluent, and not on
the gap between them.7
The overall pattern of distribution for the world at present is more unequal
than for any country except Namibia. Measured by the Gini coefficient on a scale
1 World Health Organization, ‘Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation and
Intellectual Property: Annex’ (61st World Health Assembly, 2008), para 2.
2 World Bank at www.worldbank.org (Poverty Net). The World Bank uses reference lines set at USD 1.25
and USD two a day 2005 purchasing power parity terms.
3 Among other sources, R.H. Wade, ‘Globalization, Growth, Poverty, Inequality, Resentment, and
Imperialism’ in J. Ravenhill (ed), Global Political Economy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd ed, 2008),
382, 387. Wade’s conclusion is for the period 1981-2001.
4 S.G. Reddy and C. Minoiu, ‘Has World Poverty Really Fallen?’ (2007) 3 Review of Income and Wealth 484.
5 While extreme poverty represents the more urgent concern, for the purposes of this paper, no sharp
lines need be drawn between the two types of poverty. Where it can be said to have taken place,
reduction has been dramatically inadequate for both categories of persons. Moreover, the international
poverty lines are not rigidly relied on for the purposes of applying international law in this area, with a
low-income and a multidimensional approach prevalent.
6 This paper uses the terms ‘economic, social and cultural rights’ and ‘socio-economic rights’
interchangeably.
7 Milanovic has analysed global inequalities in terms of three concepts: inequality between states,
inequality between countries weighted by population, and income distribution between individuals (or
households) in the world, termed ‘true world inequality’. B. Milanovic, ‘Global Income Inequality’ in D.
Ehrenpreis (ed), The Challenge of Inequality (Brasilia: UNDP International Poverty Centre, 2007), 6.
Summarising the findings subsequently provided above, inequality between states is widening rapidly;
inequality between countries weighted by population has shrunk since 1980, however, this is due to the
fast growth in China and India; and as Wade concludes, inequality among households is probably
increasing. Wolf concludes that there has been a decline in world-wide inequality among households, but
the chief explanation is the fast growth of China and to a lesser extent, of India. R. Wade and M. Wolf
[debate], ‘Are Global Poverty and Inequality Getting Worse?’ in D. Held and A. McGrew (eds), The
Global Transformations Reader (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2nd ed, 2003), 440-441. Milanovic remarks that
there is general agreement about the size of inequality between individuals in the world, but general
disagreement about its recent direction. ibid.
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Margot Salomon
Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
where zero is complete equality and 100 is complete inequality, the Gini
coefficient for the world is roughly 67.8 The following figures offer a clearer way
to communicate the extent of global income inequality: five per cent of individuals
in the world receive about one-third of total world income, with the top 10 per
cent receiving one-half. The ratio between the average income received by the
richest five per cent and the poorest five per cent of the world is 165:1.9 The gap
between the world’s richest country and the worlds poorest increased from 3:1 in
1820 to 70:1 in 2000,10 and is widening rapidly.11 If we compare the average
incomes for each country and weight each one by its population, income
inequality has become more equal since 1980; however this result depends on the
figures from one country. The generalised tendency of the world system over this
same period that saw the rolling out of neoliberalism globally is greater inequality,
with falling income inequality between countries since the early 1980s purely a
function of China’s fast growth.12
Does the attention of human rights law on world poverty but not on
inequality in income distribution and on living standards globally ill-serve the
subject of its concern – the world’s poor? In response to this question this paper
inquires into the focus given to the central human rights doctrine relied on to
determine the occurrence of a violation of a socio-economic right: whether the
minimum level of a given right has been met. International human rights law
articulates the principal ethical discourse of our time, with poverty and human
rights today recognised as intertwined phenomena.13 This relatively recent focus
on world poverty as a human rights issue has exposed the existence of only
inchoate theories that inform international legal developments in this area. In an
effort to scrutinise this doctrinal presupposition before it becomes reflexively
applied to considerations of world poverty, this article will explore in the first
instance whether the global gap between rich and poor should matter under
international human rights law. That is, while human rights law is concerned with
poverty, should it also be concerned with the fact that the poor are poorer than
others? For a code premised on meeting universal minimum standards and levels of
rights, why should it matter that others have more?
8 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Human Development Report 2005: International
Cooperation at a Crossroads: Aid, Trade and Security in an Unequal World (New York: UNDP, 2005), 38.
Milanovic’s findings regarding global income distribution among the world’s people indicate a similar
Gini value of between 63 and 68. Milanovic, n 7 above, 6.
9 ibid. Global wealth is even more unevenly distributed than income. The richest 10 per cent of adults in
the world own 85 per cent of global household wealth; the bottom half collectively owns barely one per
cent. J. Davies, S. Sandstrım, A. Shorrocks, and E. Wolff, ‘The Global Distribution of Household
Wealth’ in Ehrenpreis, n 7 above, 3. The results are from a recent UNU-WIDER study.
10 R. Jolly, ‘Global Inequalities’ in D.A. Clark (ed), The Elgar Companion to Development Studies (Cheltenham:
Edward Elgar, 2006), 197 (inequality between states).
11 Wade and Wolf, n 7 above, 440.
12 ibid, Wade, n 3 above, 387.
13 See CESCR, ‘Statement on Poverty and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights’ (25th session, 2001) UN Doc E/C12/2001/10.
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SOCIO-ECONOMIC RIGHTS:
MINIMUM STANDARDS, IMMEDIATE AND PROGRESSIVE
REALISATION, AND INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION
In the area of socio-economic rights international human rights law judges an
obligation to have been discharged if the minimum conditions necessary for
people to live, and to live with dignity, have been or are in the process of being
secured.14 The notion of minimum standards has been consistently adhered to
despite the varied terminology found in the provisions of the main international
treaty on the subject, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and
Cultural Rights (ICESCR).15 The article that recognises the rights of everyone as
regards living standards, food, clothing and housing is framed in terms of meeting
‘adequate’ standards,16 and also refers to the right of everyone to the ‘continuous’
improvement of living conditions.17 The right of everyone to physical and mental
health is framed in terms of meeting the ‘highest’ attainable standard.18
While the human rights doctrine articulates a general theory of universal
minimums, for the purposes of enforcement this requirement has been bifurcated,
initially compelling the urgent fulfilment of bare minimum human needs.
According to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
(CESCR),19 a ‘minimum core obligation to ensure the satisfaction of, at the very
least, minimum essential levels of each of the rights is incumbent upon every State
party’.20 Exceptionally, the objective of achieving these minimum levels imposes
immediate obligations on state parties to this treaty that otherwise allows for the
progressive realisation of rights in anticipation of the resource implications often
required to give socio-economic rights effect.21 Where people lack essential
foodstuffs, primary health care, basic shelter, housing, and education, ie
While the concept of human dignity has not, it seems, given rise to one detailed universal legal
interpretation, it nonetheless provided an articulation of the basis upon which human rights could be said
to exist and continues to play a role in the judicial interpretation of human rights, including as regards
socio-economic rights. C. McCrudden, ‘Human Dignity and Judicial Interpretation of Human Rights’
(2008) 19(4) European Journal of International Law 655.
15 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966) entered into force 3 January
1976, GA res. 2200A (XXI).
16 ibid, art 11(1). I am concerned in this paper generally with what philosophers would distinguish as
‘equality and sufficiency’ approaches, but what is also referred to by others as the difference between
‘equity and adequacy’ frameworks. Quantitative research might refer to ‘relative and absolute deprivation’.
While they all share the characteristic of distinguishing between whether having enough should provide
the appropriate metric or whether equality should, herein I will use the terms ‘equality and minimum or
threshold’ to avoid importing into this work the particular definitions that accompany a given discipline
and school of thought.
17 ibid. See also Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) entered into force 2 September 1990, GA
res. 44/25, preambular para 13: ‘Recognizing the importance of international co-operation for improving
the living conditions of children in every country, in particular in developing countries’.
18 n 15 above, art 12(1).
19 The independent body mandated to interpret the treaty.
20 CESCR, ‘The Nature of States Parties’ Obligations (art 2(1))’ General Comment No 3 (5th session,
1990) UN Doc E/1991/23 (1990), annex III, para 10. Emphasis added.
21 See for example CESCR, ‘The Right to Water (arts 11 and 12)’ General Comment No 15 (29th session,
2002) UN Doc E/C12/2002/11, para 37.
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Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
satisfaction of, at the very least, minimum essential levels of each of the rights
enunciated in the ICESCR, a state party is prima facie failing to discharge its
obligations under the Covenant.22 By way of example, CESCR indicates that
meeting core obligations with regard to the right to water would include ensuring:
access to the minimum essential amount of safe water for personal and domestic
uses; physical access to water facilities or services; access to facilities and services
on a non-discriminatory basis; and access to adequate sanitation.23 Once a state
party has ensured the core obligations of economic, social and cultural rights, ‘it
continues to have an obligation to move as expeditiously and effectively as
possible towards the full realization of all the rights in the Covenant’.24 While the
principle of progressive realisation might be said to offer within its terms and logic
more than a minimalist doctrine aimed merely at dignity, as it is set instead at a
decency standard, to date this interpretation has not been meaningfully developed
at the international level.25 The ‘full realization’ of all socio-economic rights still
only provides the universally agreed floor below which no one should fall.26
Significantly, socio-economic rights give rise to obligations of international
cooperation for states other than the right-holder’s own.27 The nature of state
parties’ obligations include those of ‘international assistance and cooperation’
CESCR, n 20 above, para 10. As Fredman points out, the shift beyond formal equality to a recognition
of substantive equality in human rights law – that equal consideration for all might require unequal
treatment in favour of the disadvantaged – recognises the place of positive duties within the discipline.
When applied to the grounds of socio-economic status, prohibiting differentiation would give rise to
redistributive requirements on the part of the state. As she further indicates, however (in the domestic
context), ‘in the case of substantive equality, neither the aims nor the means have been conclusively
articulated’, and when it comes to the contested human rights notion of a right to welfare, it is suggested
that the consensus is merely to accept that ‘the State has a basic responsibility to provide the existential
minimum’. For our purposes, recognition of a requirement of just distribution to fulfil human rights, such
as access to and the allocation of resources to redress socio-economic inequalities, might still be aimed
merely at meeting the most basic standards of well-being. The existence of (domestic) redistributive
human rights duties and the objective of fulfilling only a minimum levels of rights can (and do) co-exist.
Indeed, the shaping of post-Second World War socio-economic rights are premised on a negotiated
settlement that rested on both the notion of minimum standards and (Latin American) socialism. On the
former points, S. Fredman, Human Rights Transformed: Positive Rights and Positive Duties (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2008), 176-180, 226.
23 CESCR, n 21 above, para 37. The right to water has been read into the Covenant as indispensable to
the right to an adequate standard of living and the right to health.
24 CESCR, n 13 above, paras 17-18.
25 I thank Philip Alston for raising this important point. At the level of human rights theory and judicial
decision-making, the distinction (if any) between a dignity standard and a decency standard warrants fuller
scholarly consideration.
26 See for example CESCR’s guidance on the nature of obligations pertaining to the right to adequate
food: ‘The principal obligation is to take steps to achieve progressively the full realization of the right to
adequate food. This imposes an obligation to move as expeditiously as possible towards that goal. Every
State is obliged to ensure for everyone under its jurisdiction access to the minimum essential food which is
sufficient, nutritionally adequate and safe, to ensure their freedom from hunger’. Latter emphasis added.
CESCR, ‘The Right to Adequate Food (art 11)’ General Comment No 12 (20th session, 1999) UN Doc
E/C.12/1999/5 (1999), para 14.
27 For a consideration of the content and scope of these obligations see, M.E. Salomon, Global
Responsibility for Human Rights: World Poverty and the Development of International Law (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2007); ‘Legal Cosmopolitanism and the Normative Contribution of the Right to
Development’ in S.P. Marks (ed), Implementing the Right to Development: The Role of International Law (Geneva:
Harvard School of Public Health/Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, 2008), 17.
22
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under ICESCR article 2(1) which, under the terms of the treaty, is an obligation
aimed at achieving progressively the full realisation of the rights recognised in the
Covenant,28 and has been subsequently interpreted to include obligations of
international cooperation in order to achieve immediately the most urgent aspects
of each right, as described above with regard to the right to water. When it comes
to poverty specifically, the Committee concludes that when grouped together ‘core
obligations give rise to national responsibilities for all States and international
responsibilities for developed States, as well as others that are in a “position to
assist”. […] If a national or international anti-poverty strategy does not reflect this
minimum threshold, it is inconsistent with the legally binding obligations of the
State party’.29
Beyond its general application in ICESCR, the obligation of international
cooperation is reaffirmed in the treaty in the particular context of ‘the fundamental
right of everyone to be free from hunger’,30 requiring ‘the equitable distribution of
world food supplies in relation to need’.31 In this regard, the Committee
underscores that the world food crisis of 2008 represents a failure to meet the
obligations that would ensure the fair distribution of food supplies, just as it
signifies a failure of national and international policies to ensure physical and
economic access to food for all.32 Measures for the implementation of the
economic, social and cultural rights recognised in theConvention on the Rights of
the Child (CRC) are also to be undertaken where needed within the framework of
international cooperation with a view to the progressive realisation of the relevant
rights. In order to see them achieved, ‘particular account is to be taken of the
needs of developing countries’.33
Returning to our example of the right to water, CESCR notes that the
relevant Covenant articles require that state parties ‘recognize the essential role of
international cooperation and assistance and take joint and separate action to
achieve the full realization of the right to water’.34 This would entail: respecting the
enjoyment of the right in other countries; refraining from actions that interfere,
directly or indirectly, with the enjoyment of the right to water in other countries;
and, ensuring that activities undertaken within the state party’s jurisdiction do not
deprive another country of the ability to realise the right to water for persons in its
jurisdiction.35 Depending on the availability of resources, states should also
n 15 above, art 2(1): ‘Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps, individually
and through international assistance and co-operation, especially economic and technical, to the
maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights
recognized in the present Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of
legislative measures.’
29 CESCR, n 13 above, paras 16-17 (although the ‘others’, ie non-state actors, are not formally the bearers
of obligations under international human rights law).
30 n 15 above, art 11(2).
31 ibid, art 11(2)(b).
32 CESCR, ‘Statement on the World Food Crisis’ (40th session, 2008) UN Doc E/C.12/2008/1, para 9.
33 n 17 above, arts 4, 23(4), 24(4), 28(3).
34 CESCR, n 21 above, para 30.
35 ibid, para 31. See further paras 32-36.
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Margot Salomon
Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
facilitate the realisation of the right to water in other countries;36 state parties
should ensure that the right to water is given due attention in international
agreements;37 and that their actions as members of international organisations,
such as the World Bank and IMF, take due account of the right to water.38 Thus
the scope of the obligation that implicates external states would seem to include:
cooperation in the achievement of the minimum essential levels of the Covenant
rights; and requirements regarding the progressive realisation of the broader
aspects, or ‘full realization’ of each of the codified rights (that still only define
minimum standards of a dignified life) including through a system of equitable
distribution when it comes to food supplies for the hungry. The obligation would
also entail requirements to see realised the full range of rights, including what
might be termed non-basic rights (eg: the right to periodic holiday with pay). The
central conclusions to be drawn then are first, there exist legal obligations of
developed states to people outside of their territory; second, that the socioeconomic rights of people in developing countries are of particular concern in
light of the fact that other states are often deeply implicated in their ability to
exercise their rights; and third, that this obligation is not limited to contributing to
the immediate realisation of minimum levels of socio-economic rights, but applies
also to that which is required for the improvement of a range of rights over time.
Notably, the Committee has highlighted that ‘[s]ome of the structural
obstacles confronting developing States’ anti-poverty strategies lie beyond their
control in the contemporary international order. In its view, it is imperative that
measures be urgently taken to remove these impediments, such as unsustainable
foreign debt, the widening gap between rich and poor, and the absence of an
equitable multilateral trade, investment and financial system’.39 In this regard the
Committee draws particular attention to article 28 of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights,40 and article 3(3) of the Declaration on the Right to Development
(DRD),41 both of which address the need for an international order conducive to
the exercise of human rights and people-centred development.
These tentative admonitions by the Committee introduce egalitarian
concerns: that it is unjust and unfair for some people (and countries) to be worse
off than others through no fault of their own;42 that it is equally important that
people’s lives go well, and to this end everyone should have equality of life
prospects and life circumstances;43 that global income inequality matters; and that
ibid, para 34.
ibid, para 35.
38 ibid, para 36.
39 CESCR, n 13 above, para 21. See also CESCR, n 32 above, paras 12-13.
40 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, GA res. 217A (III), 10 Dec. 1948, UN GAOR, 3rd Session
Resolutions, pt 1, UN Doc A/810 (1948), 71.
41 Declaration on the Right to Development, GA res A/RES/41/128, December 4, 1986, UN GAOR
Supplement. (No 53) 186, UN Doc A/RES/41/53 (1986), annex 41.
42 See L.S. Temkin, ‘Egalitarianism Defended’ (2003) 113 Ethics 764, 767. Of course, this statement
should not be understood to relieve developing countries of their respective human rights obligations.
43 See S. Gosepath, ‘Equality’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2007), 24 at
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/equality/.
36
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crushing foreign debt and a partial international economic and financial system are
a hindrance to equality of opportunity.
Its pronouncements on asymmetries in political and economic arrangements
notwithstanding, the Committee has not transitioned from a focus on poverty and
the idea of universal basic rights to one more sensitive to demands of global
equality: the prevailing doctrine that provides the basis for determining
compliance is that of an international minimum threshold, reinforcing the premise
that a marginally tolerable life nonetheless passes the human rights test. By relying
on the threshold measure, a non-relational standard guides the approach to
protecting and promoting socio-economic rights and confronting poverty. Despite
recognition by the Committee of the existence of global income inequality that
precludes the exercise of rights, and of obligations that require parties cooperate in
addressing its structural causes at the international level, this seems not to
influence CESCR’s consideration as to whether the relevant rights have been
satisfied. On the threshold model, whether rights have been fulfilled can be
ascertained merely by looking at the circumstances of any one person without
needing to refer to the situation of anyone else.44
‘Minimum’ then is the threshold that pertains to the downtrodden, to the
deprived, to the victims of human rights violations. However, by focussing our
attention on what is minimally required, the doctrine overlooks the significance of
appraising the wider implications of having a minority of people continue to
secure a ‘maximum’ level of rights. Given the shared dependencies created by
globalisation, should not concern be with those who possess not only less than the
minimum, but far more than the minimum, in so far as those two conditions are
relational? In order to address the ‘massive and systemic breach’ of international
human rights law that poverty represents,45 it would seem that international law in
this area should be concerned not purely with the absolute position of the worseoff members of our global society, but also with the inequality that characterises
our contemporary world order. Below will be explored various grounds for greater
egalitarian consideration in this area of international law: poverty as an issue of
unequal distribution of resources and not of scarcity; global equality as an
instrumental good; and global equality as an intrinsic good.
C.R. Beitz, The Idea of Human Rights (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 161. As Beitz
subsequently points out, a threshold measure is compatible with a range of distributive justice
conceptions (here he is referring to the domestic level) provided that they result in the threshold being
met. ibid, 162.
45 CESCR, n 13 above, para 4.
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Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
WORLD POVERTY AND INEQUALITY
WHY
SHOULD IT MATTER THAT OTHERS HAVE MORE?
– POVERTY
IN (MODERN)
TIMES OF PLENTY
One reason why reducing economic inequality matters, and not just reducing
poverty, is because poverty is not only unfair, it is needlessly unfair. Roughly 43
per cent of the world population (2,735 million) lives below a World Bank poverty
line of USD two a day, yet consumes only 1.3 per cent of the global product, while
high-income countries, with far less people (955 million citizens), together
consume 81 per cent of the global product.46 World Bank figures indicate that
high-income countries that already receive 81 per cent of the global product could
give up a modest degree of their wealth – 0.7 per cent gross national income,
which is enough to eradicate poverty – without sacrificing anything of comparable
value.47 In fact one could assume that they would be going some way to fulfilling
their treaty obligations by undertaking measures within the ‘framework of
international cooperation’ to the ‘maximum extent of their available resources’
towards the realisation of these rights.48 The cost of ending extreme poverty – the
amount needed to lift one billion people (according to UNDP figures) above the
(then) USD one a day poverty line – is equivalent to less than two per cent of the
income of the richest 10 per cent of the world population.49 Simply put, hordes of
people are dying of starvation not only because they are poor, but because there
are rich people who will not share. Under these conditions the relational global
state of affairs matters.
Of course the notion of ‘sharing’ misrepresents many of the reasons for the
unequal access globally to goods. First, the poor have had what is rightfully theirs
– access to essential goods, opportunity under fair conditions, benefits derived of
(their) natural resources – taken from them for the enrichment of the powerful
(largely powerful states and their industries, but also corrupt elites in developing
countries).50 So their poverty is, in important ways, a result of being dispossessed
of what belongs to them and if ‘returned’ would redress their dire state.51 Put
T. Pogge, ‘World Poverty and Human Rights’ (2005) 19(1) Ethics and International Affairs 1, 1. Pogge
draws his figures from the World Bank’s World Development Report 2003. See further Milanovic, n 7 above,
6-7.
47 ibid, 1; see P. Singer, ‘Famine, Affluence and Morality’ (1972) 3(1) Philosophy and Public Affairs 229.
48 Convention on the Rights of the Child, n 17 above, art 4; International Covenant on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights, n 15 above, art 2(1).
49 Measured in 2000 purchasing power parity terms. UNDP, n 8 above, 38.
50 On the contribution of international law and policy to global dispossession and vice versa, see A.
Anghie, Imperialism, Sovereignty and the Making of International Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2004); A.C. Cutler, ‘Toward a Radical Political Economy Critique of Transnational Economic Law’ in S.
Marks (ed), International Law on the Left: Re-examining Marxist Legacies (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2008), 199; M.E. Salomon, ‘Poverty, Privilege and International Law: The Millennium
Development Goals and the Guise of Humanitarianism’, Special Issue on Poverty as a Challenge to
International Law’ (2008) 51 German Yearbook of International Law 39.
51 On international trade as a system of legalised theft, see L. Wenar, ‘Property Rights and the Resource
Curse’ (2008) 36 Philosophy and Public Affairs 1, 2.
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another way, why should it matter that others have more? Because much of what
they have belongs to other people, and moreover, those people do not have
enough. Second, as noted above, financial resources necessary to eradicate poverty
exist alongside the persistence of mass deprivation. This establishes that the
problem of world poverty is not one of scarcity but of unequal distribution.52
The failure to secure the socio-economic rights of so many people is largely a
consequence of a global system that structurally disadvantages half the world
population.53 The contemporary global institutional order – a creation of powerful
states – has provided conditions under which extraordinary deprivation continues
to be the plight of many, and inequality has been able to flourish. The inequality
we know today did not come about under a scheme of equal opportunity and
mutual advantage; inequality is not the result of some accidental deviation from
neo-liberal capitalism, but rather a deliberate product of the international political
economy.54 Under these terms, we are required to see poverty ‘not simply as an
occurrence but as a policy option and practical project. It is something that certain
groups of people do to others’.55 We are thus led to the logical conclusion, as
Marks points out, that ‘poverty is not just a condition, but a relationship’.56
Both examples provided – the ‘theft’ of that which belongs to the poor, and
the lack of access to available resources – indicate that the abundance enjoyed by
the global minority is erected upon the very same bounty denied to others. Under
globalised conditions the principal problem of the poor is not their poverty but
rather the wealth of others, and the mechanics through which their dispossession
is made possible.
M. Craven, ‘The Violence of Dispossession: Extraterritoriality and Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights’ in M.A. Baderin and R. McCorquodale (eds), Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in Action (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2007), 86; M.E. Salomon, ‘International Human Rights Obligations in Context:
Structural Obstacles and the Demands of Global Justice’ in B.A. Andreassen and S.P. Marks (eds),
Development as a Human Right: Legal, Political and Economic Dimensions (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
2006), 113-114: ‘Hunger concentrated in developing countries is not a result of there being not enough
food to eat but rather of certain people just not having enough to eat — this raises serious questions of
distribution, access, and accountability.’ This is also a reason given to justify the idea that poverty is a
‘violation’ of human rights, ie: because it is possible for the world to be free of poverty, yet it is not done.
See among others S. Chauvier, ‘The Right to Basic Resources’ in Thomas Pogge (ed) Freedom from Poverty
as a Human Right: Who Owes What to the Very Poor? (Oxford: UNESCO/Oxford University Press, 2007),
306.
53 See M.E. Salomon, ‘International Human Rights Obligations in Context: Structural Obstacles and the
Demands of Global Justice’ in B.A. Andreassen and S.P. Marks (eds) Development as a Human Right: Legal,
Political and Economic Dimensions (Antwerp: Intersentia, 2nd ed, 2010), 121; Global Responsibility for Human
Rights, n 27 above; S. Marks, ‘Human Rights and the Bottom Billion’ (2009) 1 European Human Rights Law
Review 37.
54 See S. Marks, ‘Exploitation as an International Legal Concept’ in Marks, n 50 above, 281.
55 Marks, n 53 above, 48.
56 ibid.
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WHY SHOULD IT MATTER THAT OTHERS HAVE MORE? – GLOBAL EQUALITY AS AN
INSTRUMENTAL GOOD
Equality can be an instrumental good in so far as it provides a means to the
desired end.57 It may be valuable, for example, if it expedites poverty alleviation
and human rights fulfilment or renders advances more sustainable. But it might
also have value even if it does not stimulate growth or reduce poverty as quickly as
inequality does.
Free-market advocates traditionally argue that income inequality, a hallmark
of trade liberalisation, provides incentives for effort and risk-taking
entrepreneurship and thereby spurs efficiency and productivity, the gains from
which will trickle down and are helpful for the living standards of the poor over
time. While a system that encourages individual productivity may well have its
wider benefits, existing inequalities in the distribution of goods cannot be justified
on utilitarian grounds since they clearly ‘give the few far more reward than is
necessary to encourage productivity, while denying the vast majority of the [global]
population the essentials (health care and educational opportunity, for example)
necessary for them to develop their full capacity for productivity’.58 Second, there
are no definitive conclusions as to whether a rising level of income inequality
causes faster growth, as Wade concludes ‘even if strong relationships between
inequality and subsequent growth were found, the causality is questionable’,59 and
as Stigltiz and others point out, ‘the evidence against trickle-down economics is
now overwhelming’.60
On a human rights account, the argument that the poor will ultimately benefit,
that is that they benefit ‘over time’, is difficult to defend. Human rights are not to
be postponed for pronounced greater objectives, for example, an increase in
national or global wealth or for benefits anticipated at some indeterminate time in
the future. From the perspective of human rights theory, the argument made for
sacrificing distributional equity in favour of rapid accumulation is rejected.61 At the
Drawing on Raz, and Clayton and Williams, White remarks that its ‘instrumental value is derived from
the way in which it serves to promote some other value’. S. White, Equality (Cambridge: Polity Press,
2007), 14.
58 T.M. Franck, Fairness in International Law and Institutions (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), 20.
59 Wade, n 3 above, 401.
60 ‘The evidence against trickle-down economics is now overwhelming, at least in the sense that an
increase in average incomes is not sufficient to raise the incomes of the poor for prolonged periods.’ J.E.
Stiglitz, ‘Is there a Post-Washington Consensus?’ in N. Serra and J.E. Stiglitz (eds), The Washington
Consensus Reconsidered: Towards a New Global Governance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 47; ‘It
used to be claimed at one time that the benefits of a rapid expansion of GDP would automatically
“trickle down” to the poor, so that a high growth rate of GDP could very legitimately be looked upon as
the summum bonum of the development effort. This claim however has been so obviously discredited that
few would make it now.’ P. Patnaik, ‘A Left Approach to Development’ (July 2010) XLV Economic and
Political Weekly 30, 33.
61 Donnelly refers to this as the ‘equity trade-off’. J. Donnelly, ‘Human Rights, Democracy and
Development’ (1999) 21(3) Human Rights Quarterly 608, 626-627. Uvin points out though that since the
evidence indicates that poverty and inequality always increase in the absence of economic growth, and
with that the enjoyment of human rights decline for many, if not most, poor people, ‘all things being
57
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level of international law (rather than theory), socio-economic rights that are met
over time might be consistent with the principle of progressive realisation if they
meet certain criteria (the obligation to move as expeditiously as possible towards
the goal;62 steps taken that are deliberate, concrete and targeted,63 and are
consistent with the principle of non-retrogression),64 but would not comply with
the immediate obligation to secure the minimum essential level of rights for people
suffering from extreme poverty. Nor would it seem to reflect a commitment to
protecting and promoting human rights as ‘the first responsibility of
Governments’.65
But the main issue for the purposes of this paper is whether we got the tradeoffs right. What price has been paid for the allegedly beneficial inequality, and who
has had to pay it? Is average income an appropriate measure of successful
development domestically or a suitable measure of well-being globally, or might
the preference be for a society in which the vast majority of people are doing
better, where there is a role for distribution and not only efficiency and growth,
even if a countries’ total gross domestic product or the global economy as a whole
grow more slowly as a result?66 Equality might be upheld as one value among
others, and economic performance and the reduction of poverty may be included
with equality in a ‘pluralistic ethics’.67 There are a good number of things that
equal, if trade-offs or setting priorities among human rights are required, those choices that do not (or
least) retard economic growth should be privileged’. P. Uvin, Human Rights and Development (Bloomfield:
Kumarian Press, 2004), 191.
62 See for example CESCR, n 26 above, para 14.
63 CESCR, n 20 above, para 2.
64 See further Salomon, Global Responsibility for Human Rights, n 27 above, 124.
65 UN World Conference on Human Rights, Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action (1993), UN
Doc A/CONF 157/23 Pt I, art 1.
66 See Stiglitz, n 60 above, 46-47. Patnaik outlines a ‘left alternative development strategy’ focussed on a
stream of measures eg: land reforms, the promotion and protection of peasant agriculture and petty
production, activation of the public sector including to counter corporate aggrandisement, strategies for
the rapid elimination of unemployment, a massive spate of welfare measures, and where governments
invite private investment, they do so retaining a ‘level of concessions which they will not exceed in
entertaining private project proposals’. He acknowledges that such a strategy ‘may not achieve growth
rates as high as the bourgeois strategy does over certain periods’, but it has the ‘advantage of directly
addressing the aim of development which is to improve the living conditions of the people’. He goes on
to remark: ‘Instead of GDP growth rate becoming the main focus, under the chimerical assumption that
it will bring about development, this strategy directly addresses the problem of development; the growth
that occurs is a fallout of it. And in the worst-case scenario, even if no growth occurs, addressing the
question of development directly is still preferable on grounds that John Stuart Mill had made famous,
when he had declared his unconcern over the “stationarity” of a “stationary state” as long as the workers
were better off in it.’ Patnaik, n 60 above, 34-35. Notably, Wilkinson and Pickett in their acclaimed study
on the importance of equality (in developed countries) for the realisation of a whole host of benefits,
highlight more generally that: ‘it is worth remembering that the argument for greater equality is not
necessarily an argument for big government. Given that there are many different ways of diminishing
inequality, what matters is creating the necessary political will to pursue any of them’. R. Wilkinson and
K. Pickett, The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone (London: Penguin Books, 2010), 247.
67 R. Arneson, ‘Egalitarianism’ (2002) Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 10 at
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/egalitarianism/.
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Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
might be deemed valuable, but has an acceptable compromise been found for
when these values conflict in practice?68
There should also be greater concern for global income inequality and not
only the poverty of the worst off because that inequality is matched by vast
differentials in political power. Greater material equality and thus the increased
opportunity to participate meaningfully in international decision-making is a
‘positional good’: its possession relative to one’s peers – be it countries or
individuals – matters significantly.69 Unequal relations entrench the advantages of
the powerful given their superior negotiating leverage, wealth and influence. The
world economy at present also has 40 per cent of the population living on income
so low as to preclude fully participating in wealth creation.70 The ability of the
poor to participate in the shared life of a global society is made very difficult due
to their absolute position of poverty, but exacerbated by the exclusion caused by
their relational poverty. It is not only that they cannot afford to participate, but
they are unable to participate as others do. As Fleurbaey remarks, [i]t is inequality
in wealth, and not poverty as such, that generates a comparative advantage
between the rich and poor […].’71 This state of affairs may well amount to indirect
discrimination, a point to which we will return. It also indicates that a certain
degree of equality is instrumental to the participation of the poor in global life.
Approaches based on equality of opportunity place greater emphasis on
procedure than on outcome. Each person should have an equal chance of living
the life of her choice (subject to limitations given the same rights of others).
Individual advantage should be independent from circumstances over which
persons have no control, such as, her sex, family background or place of birth.72
As such, inequalities due to factors beyond the individual’s responsibility are
inequitable.73 Gosepath explains that ‘[e]quality of opportunity is meant to equalise
outcomes, insofar as they are the consequences of causes beyond a person’s
control (ie beyond circumstances or endowment), but to allow differential
outcomes insofar as they result from autonomous choice or ambition’.74 The
68 ibid. Sagoff eloquently reminds us that it is legitimate also to prioritise other values over efficiency; he
writes: ‘Economists as a rule do recognize one other value, namely justice or equality, and they speak,
therefore, of a “trade-off” between efficiency and equality. They do not speak, as they should, however,
about the trade-off between efficiency and our aesthetic and moral values. What about the trade-off
between efficiency and self-respect, efficiency and the magnificence of our natural heritage, efficiency and
quality of life?’ M. Sagoff, ‘Economic Theory and Environmental Law’ (1980-1981) 79 Michigan Law
Review 1393, 1417.
69 W.S. Koski and R. Reich, ‘When “Adequate” Isn’t: The Retreat from Equity in Educational Law and
Policy and Why it Matters’ (2006) 56(3) Emory Law Journal 545, 595 et seq. The authors use the term
‘positional good’ as derived from the work of F. Hirsch, Social Limits to Growth (1976).
70 UNDP, n 8 above, 38. The Report further remarks that it is also hardly good for shared prosperity and
growth and as such is ‘damaging to the public interest’, including political stability. ibid.
71 M. Fleurbaey, ‘Poverty as a Form of Oppression’ in T. Pogge, n 52 above, 145.
72 Ferreira drawing on the economist John Roemer in F.H.G. Ferreira, ‘Inequality as Cholesterol’ in
Ehrenpreis, n 7 above, 20. For a consideration of the views among political philosophers on equality of
opportunity, see W. Kymlicka, Contemporary Political Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd ed,
2002), 57-60.
73 And inequalities in opportunity are intrinsically objectionable.
74 Gosepath, n 43 above, 21.
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concentration of poverty in certain parts of the world today has come about, in
large part, due to inequality of opportunity globally. This advantage is reflected in
many of the institutions and rules that shape the global economy: a system from
which certain states (and people) have disproportionately benefited. Is it judicious
to evaluate efforts at eradicating poverty based only on whether minimum
standards are being met, while ignoring pivotal sources of the inequality that may
engender that poverty? Investigating the terms under which the rich countries
have been able to acquire their dominance exposes an absence of equality of
opportunity globally – a factor that is overlooked if the focus is limited to meeting
minimum standards.
The gap between rich and poor might also create problems for the process of
development itself given that it is accompanied by enormous disparities in
technological capability, human capital and investment resources,75 and the
unsustainable use of natural resources by the North (that drove its own economic
development). Inequality might affect other matters of public international
importance, including: political legitimacy (the global ‘democratic deficit’), conflict,
forced migration, and the erosion of the goodwill necessary for action against
threats that require international cooperation, such as climate change.76 In light of
the collateral damage that global inequality is found to produce, it would seem that
serious consideration as to how greater equality might serve a range of benefits is
merited.
WHY SHOULD IT MATTER THAT OTHERS HAVE MORE? – GLOBAL EQUALITY AS AN
INTRINSIC GOOD
Although it can be convincingly argued that some equalities have an intrinsic
value, it cannot be that even such equalities are the only value. To appreciate why
this is the case Amartya Sen offers an example of the ‘levelling-down’ objection.
Sen highlights the seeming absurdity of defending the notion of intrinsic equality
of life expectancy between women and men by imagining the proposal that
healthcare to women is cut because they possess greater longevity than men so by
reducing their access to healthcare we would thereby encourage equality in life
expectancy between the sexes.77 On the face of it Sen’s example of limiting
healthcare to women would make it difficult to defend that life expectancy equality
is a good in and of itself, but this tentative conclusion warrants further challenge.
See T. Lines, Making Poverty: A History (London: Zed Books, 2008), 16; UNDP, n 8 above, 38.
As Beitz highlights in his work on the subject, one can care about global inequality without the ‘prior
adoption of a particular theoretical view about the moral character of the global community or of an
egalitarian social ideal […] ’. He distinguishes ‘directly egalitarian’ (ie: intrinsic) reasons for objecting to
inequality that are premised on ‘an ideal of society as an association of equals’, from ‘derivative’ (nonegalitarian and instrumental) reasons as to why global economic and political inequalities matter, such as,
the impacts of global inequalities on poverty, agency and fairness in political decision-making. C.R. Beitz,
‘Does Global Inequality Matter?’ in T.W. Pogge (ed), Global Justice (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2001),
106 et seq.
77 A. Sen, ‘The Idea of Justice’ (London School of Economics (27 July 2009, at
www.lse.ac.uk/collections/LSEPublicLecturesAndEvents/).
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Suggesting that parity may not matter most is different from suggesting that it
does not matter at all.78 As Temkin explains: ‘The anti-egalitarian will
incredulously ask, do I really think there is some respect in which a world where
only some are blind is worse than one where all are? Yes. Does this mean I think it
would be better if we blinded everyone? No. Equality is not all that matters. But it
matters some.’79 Thus, would we prefer to see everyone in the world try to eek out
an existence on USD 1.25 a day in order to establish global income equality? No.
But that does not demonstrate that equality has no intrinsic value.80 Second and
related, as Swift points out, merely because equality does not resolve all our
concerns does not lead to the conclusion that we cannot find something
intrinsically wrong, or unfair if some people are worse off than others, all the more
so if the inequalities are due to circumstances beyond their control.81
Third, living in conditions of equality benefit people due to their ‘experiences
of equality’;82 to live in a community in which equality prevails would seem to have
intrinsic value. The value of this experience would apply also when reflective of
one’s place within the global community, perhaps more so than within the smaller
social environment. Since modern technology increases awareness of other
people’s income and opportunities, these conditions are said to heighten the
perception (or experience) of inequality. In this regard Milanovic remarks that
H. Steiner, ‘How Equality Matters’ (2002) 19(1) Social Philosophy and Policy Foundation 342, 346. The
‘levelling-down’ objection merely leads to the conclusion that equality cannot be the only or the supreme
value. See generally White, n 57 above, 21.
79 Temkin as cited in White, ibid.
80 Casal convincingly argues that: ‘Under any reasonable reading, egalitarians are committed to
distributing rather than destroying benefits and to doing so in a manner that that satisfies each
individual’s equal claim to be benefited […].’ P. Casal, ‘Why Sufficiency is not Enough’ (2007) 117(2)
Ethics 296, 307. Similarly, ‘[i]t should be noted that the value human rights law puts on equality is not
entirely neutral. Everyone being treated equally badly is not a human rights concept. It is not sufficient to
ensure that no-one is being discriminated against if the consequence is that all groups are treated with an
equal lack of respect or lack of opportunity to participate in social and civic life. […] [Citing Lord Walker]
“In the field of human rights, discrimination is regarded as particularly objectionable because it disregards
fundamental notions of human dignity and equality before the law.” […] As such, under the human rights
vision of equality any difference in treatment should generally involve a levelling up and not a levelling
down’. F. Klug and H. Wildbore, ‘Equality, Dignity and Discrimination under Human Rights Law:
Selected Cases’ (2005), 2 at www.lse.ac.uk/human-rights. Furthermore, ‘equalizing down’ can produce
just results (results that redress a human rights violation). In the case of Waldman v Canada (694/96), one
option available to Canada when found in violation of article 26 on non-discrimination under the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights was to cease exclusively funding Roman Catholic
private schools as it had been doing since 1867 when there were reasonable and objective criteria for
doing so, in order both to ensure that other religious denominations without private funding were not
discriminated against and so that the resources could be put into the public school system, to which
people of all denominations had access. The term ‘equalizing down’ is from A. Lester and S. Joseph,
‘Obligations of Non-Discrimination’ in D. Harris and S. Joseph (eds), The International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights and United Kingdom Law (Gloucestershire: Clarendon Press, 1995), 594.
81 ‘Even if equality does not fulfil all our needs for justice, we don’t have to abandon our intuition that
there is something wrong about inequalities due to circumstances beyond people’s control. […] [A]
situation that, though better overall, [can be] worse in the particular respect that it is unfair.’ A. Swift,
Political Philosophy (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2001), 123-124. See also Temkin, n 42 above, 764.
82 J. Raz, ‘On the Value of Distributional Equality’ (University of Oxford, Legal Research Papers Series,
No 41/2008, October 2008), 14.
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‘[e]ven if globalisation were to raise everybody’s real income, it could exacerbate,
rather than moderate, feelings of despondency and deprivation among the poor’.83
Fourth, the situation in which the global poor find themselves might be
understood as discriminatory. The rules that regulate the global economy, and
their application, may not set out to exclude them from accessing goods that
others with sufficient resources can secure, such as an adequate standard of living,
food, clothing and housing, but they do. This ‘negative externality’ of a global
system set up to create profit rather than alleviate poverty,84 might constitute
indirect discrimination if it creates a distinction based on economic and social
situations – which has the effect of impairing the exercise of rights, by all persons,
on an equal footing.85 Discrimination of this sort is problematic instrumentally, for
example by limiting access to resources and to effective participation in decisionmaking, but suffering discrimination is also a condition that is intrinsically bad.
On this non-instrumental account it would seem that global equality matters.
It is not all that matters, as the levelling-down example has shown egalitarians
(generally) recognise other values besides equality. It may not even be the ideal
that matters most; but to believe in the idea of ‘comparative fairness’ for its own
sake suggests that equality has an independent normative significance.86
MINIMUM STANDARDS OR FAIR DISTRIBUTION UNDER
INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS LAW?
So far this study has sought to demonstrate that global economic inequality should
matter to international human rights law, in addition to the existing doctrinal
focuses on meeting minimum (essential) thresholds and universal minimum
standards. A subsequent matter for this article to consider is whether positive
international human rights law accommodates a doctrine of fair global
distribution. It began by demonstrating that minimalist approaches inform this
area of international law, even if CESCR deduces for example that the existing
gross inequalities between the health status of people in developed and developing
countries is ‘unacceptable’, and therefore an issue of ‘common concern to all
Milanovic, n 7 above, 7. The lived experiences of the poor are chronicled in a three-volume study
carried out by the World Bank in which their awareness of international inequalities and disadvantage is
recorded. See D. Narayan, R. Chambers, M.K. Shah, and P. Petesch, Voices of the Poor: Crying Out for Change
(New York: World Bank/Oxford University Press, 2000).
84 Chauvier, n 52 above, 308-309.
85 Under international human rights law discrimination is any distinction based on the prohibited grounds
– grounds that include economic and social situations – which has the purpose or effect of nullifying and
impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise by all persons, on an equal footing, of all rights and
freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field. Indirect discrimination refers to
laws, policies or practices which appear neutral, but have a disproportionate impact on the exercise of
rights by particular groups. See, CESCR, ‘Non-Discrimination in Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
(art 2(2))’, General Comment No 20 (42nd session, 2009) UN Doc E/C.12/GC/20.
86 Temkin, n 42 above, 768-769.
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countries’.87 What remains to be explored is how this unease with global inequality
as guardedly voiced by the Committee might be reconciled with what on the face
of it appears to be a ‘thin theory’ of human rights devoted merely to meeting
people’s basic rights.
The intermittent treaty references to the ‘continuous improvement’ of living
conditions and a system of ‘equitable distribution’ in the case of hunger should not
be read in isolation but rather as part of a much larger post-1945 international
effort to situate the eradication of material deprivation within a process of humancentred development. Even before the full magnitude of the transnational socioeconomic interconnection we know today became manifest, international
cooperation was always understood within the modern human rights period as
essential to the realisation of certain rights.88 The Declaration on the Right to
Development, the central human rights instrument that focuses on duties at the
international level and not only, or primarily, at the national level, substantiates
this view.
Through an elaboration of duties of international cooperation the Declaration
advances a normative agenda in support of claims against the public international
order. It confronts the failure of our international arrangements to allow for an
environment conducive to the realisation of human rights for all. Accordingly,
developing states have the right (ie: the prerogative) as against the international
community of states to formulate development policies ‘that aim at the constant
improvement of the well-being of the entire population and of all individuals, on
the basis of their active, free and meaningful participation in development and in
the fair distribution of the benefits resulting therefrom’.89 Developed states for
their part ‘have the duty to co-operate with each other in ensuring development
and eliminating obstacles to development’;90 and ‘the duty to take steps,
individually and collectively, to formulate international development policies with
a view to facilitating the full realization of the right to development’.91 Effective
international cooperation is nothing short of ‘essential’ as a complement to the
efforts of developing countries,92 if people are going to be able to claim their
entitlement ‘to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural
and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms
can be fully realized’.93
The language of duties that characterises this Declaration reinforces the idea
that this right to development is less about establishing a new substantive right,
and more about framing a system of duties – in particular international duties –
CESCR, ‘The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Physical and Mental Health (art 12)’ General
Comment No 14 (22nd session, 2000) UN Doc E/C12/2000/4, para 38.
88 See generally Salomon, Global Responsibility for Human Rights, n 27 above.
89 n 41 above, art 2(3).
90 ibid, art 3(3). This article reiterates the claims of developing countries from the 1970s for a ‘new
international economic order’.
91 ibid, art 4(1).
92 ibid, art 4(2).
93 ibid, art 1(1).
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that might give better effect to existing rights.94 The DRD places the claims of
developing countries suffering from poverty and underdevelopment at the centre
of the international political economy, where their calls for an environment
favourable to the fulfillment of human rights might be heeded. It demands not
merely cooperation for the achievement of human rights central to addressing
deprivations and facilitating human flourishing, but also changes to the system of
structural disadvantage that defines the current international order.95 As CESCR
emphasised in the initial years of its work when outlining the nature of obligations
under the Covenant, socio-economic rights will be met throughout the world only
by international endeavor, and this specific treaty obligation is rooted in the
modern ‘international law of cooperation’ of the 20th and 21st centuries.96 As
Craven has rightly highlighted, this emphasis on the international environment shifts
the focus of the problem from one of scarcity, and places greater importance
instead on the question of distribution.97 As such, the terms of the Declaration
serve to bolster the Committee’s intuitions that compliance with the Covenant
surely requires more than securing an existence on the brink.
The Declaration’s centre of attention on norms of distributive justice for
development objectives moves human rights beyond its more narrow concerns of
fulfilling basic needs to the greater project of reducing material inequality, but it
also seeks to confront the fact that economic inequality is so readily bound up
with inequalities of power. The DRD’s requirement that states take responsibility,
inter alia, for the ‘creation of international conditions favourable to the realization of
the right to development’98 indicates an awareness that the ills of which it speaks
are mediated by the institutions that have fashioned the global environment that is
home not to some of us but to us all.99 As a comprehensive challenge to this
biased arrangement, equality of opportunity for development under the
Salomon, Global Responsibility for Human Rights, n 27 above, 7.
ibid, 6.
96 ‘The Committee wishes to emphasize that in accordance with Articles 55 and 56 of the Charter of the
United Nations, with well-established principles of international law, and with the provisions of the
Covenant itself, international cooperation for development and thus for the realization of economic,
social and cultural rights is an obligation of all States. It is particularly incumbent upon those States which
are in a position to assist others in this regard. The Committee notes in particular the importance of the
Declaration on the Right to Development adopted by the General Assembly in its resolution 41/128 of 4
December 1986 and the need for States parties to take full account of all of the principles recognized
therein. It emphasizes that, in the absence of an active programme of international assistance and
cooperation on the part of all those States that are in a position to undertake one, the full realization of
economic, social and cultural rights will remain an unfulfilled aspiration in many countries.’ n 20 above,
para 14. The contemporary ‘international law of cooperation’ is distinguished from the outdated
‘international law of coexistence’ of the 17th and 18th centuries. W. Friedmann, The Changing Structure of
International Law (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964).
97 Craven, n 52 above, 86.
98 n 41 above, art 3(1). Emphasis added.
99 On the general point of inequalities being mediated by organisations see D. Moellendorf, ‘Human
Dignity, Respect, and Global Inequality’ (3rd International Global Ethics Association Conference,
Bristol, July 2010) (on file with author).
94
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Declaration is framed as a ‘prerogative both of nations and of individuals who
make up nations’.100
Our concern with inequality speaks to material inequality and the need for
fairer distribution of income, land and other goods, but importantly, it also
includes the structures that in many ways generate the disparities. What is also to
be evaluated is the system of rules and institutions – the economic order,101
introducing an imperative to modify the international rules, including the means
by which they are determined and interpreted.102 As commentators have pointed
out, the move towards equality in this context is not limited to the distribution of
goods, but includes the establishment of just institutional procedural principles,103
and a system of rules that distribute the consequential effects of the law fairly.104
The right to development with its focus on fair global arrangements underscores
this emphasis on process over outcome, on conduct over result.105 On this
account, we can see how obligations requiring international cooperation bring us
beyond a thin theory of human rights as minimums to somewhere else entirely.
CONCLUSION
The commitment to reducing poverty will certainly be motivated by the desire to
eliminate the grave harms that it causes. But this cardinal objective should not
preclude a concurrent drive to narrow the global gap between rich and poor
because greater equality may be instrumental to human development objectives
and in undoing the injurious concentration of wealth and power, and because
inequality offers the poor individual a negative experience within the global
100 n 41 above, preamble. Article 8(1) of the Declaration calls for equality of opportunity domestically:
‘States should undertake, at the national level, all necessary measures for the realization of the right to
development and shall ensure, inter alia, equality of opportunity for all in their access to basic resources,
education, health services, food, housing, employment and the fair distribution of income. Effective
measures should be undertaken to ensure that women have an active role in the development process.
Appropriate economic and social reforms should be carried out with a view to eradicating all social
injustices.’
101 Zanetti, drawing on the work of Thomas Pogge in V. Zanetti, ‘Egalitarian Global Distributive Justice
or Minimal Standard? Pogge’s Position’ in A. Follesdal and T. Pogge (eds), Real World Justice: Grounds,
Principles, Human Rights, and Social Institutions (Dordrecht: Springer, 2005), 208.
102 The work of Robert Howse emphasises the positive impact that would come to bear on poverty
through changing the interpretative practices and culture surrounding the existing rules (especially
integrating existing positive international human rights law into the interpretation of economic rules),
over changes to the formal rules themselves. R. Howse, ‘Accountability Issues in International Economic
Governance’ (Conference on the Accountability for Human Rights Violations by International
Organizations, International Law Association Belgian Branch, Brussels, March 2007) (on file with
author); R. Howse, Mainstreaming the Right to Development into International Trade Law and Policy at the World
Trade Organization, UN Doc E/CN 4/Sub 2/2004/17; R. Howse and R. Teitel, ‘Global Justice, Poverty,
and the International Economic Order’ in S. Besson and J. Tasioulas (eds), The Philosophy of International
Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 447.
103 Zanetti, n 101 above, 208; and see Franck, n 58 above.
104 Franck, ibid, 8.
105 For coverage of this issue, see Salomon, Global Responsibility for Human Rights, n 27 above, 132-143
(Obligations of Conduct at the International Level).
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community setting. The focus on the international environment provided for in
human rights instruments seeks to redress unevenly apportioned costs and
benefits of globalisation and, as such, invites a deeper consideration of the place of
global economic inequality and fair distribution in the doctrines that have guided
the discipline. Under global structures that have, on a generous appraisal, failed to
address adequately the extent and concentration of material deprivation we know
today, it is time to look anew not only at requirements to distribute goods fairly,
but also at the just allotment of influence over the shape (and now future) of the
global economy. The wrong that international human rights law need confront is
not only that of poverty but also of unequal resource distribution, and, in
particular, international mechanisms and arrangements that preclude equal
distribution.
Its tenets hold the possibility for an interpretation that better accommodates
this collective venture of distributive justice; there is nothing inherent in its
theoretical underpinnings on the nature of rights or obligations that limit the
human rights project to sanctioning merely the bare bones of what it means to be
human. To the contrary, those who defend the minimalist human rights doctrine
might be called on to explain how their commitment to equal dignity and the
sanctity of each human life leads them to defend the requirement of meeting the
threshold test but does not also necessitate that we aim for human equality.106 If
poverty alleviation is to become the sole raison d’ệtre of international human rights
law in this area, we will forfeit the greater claim of the poor to dwell in possibility
and abandon them ‘to die without leaving any trace, without having contributed
anything to a common world’.107 In the fitting words of Hannah Arendt, they will
come to know that ‘[…] the abstract nakedness of being nothing but human was
their greatest danger’.108
To be sure, poverty points up a critically important non-comparative element;
deprivation is a dire scourge and needs to be addressed immediately regardless of
who else has what or how it has been obtained. But this more narrow reading
focused on poverty reduction does not render the relative deprivation of the poor
irrelevant; these are not mutually exclusive characterisations. Poverty matters, but
so does the fact – on a range of grounds – that others have more, and importantly,
that the international system allows for wide-scale material deprivation just as it
does inequitable economic and political gains which then spur a range of
(dis)advantages.
Whether our concern should be with reducing global inequality and not only
poverty will remain a matter of ongoing debate for a number of disciplines, yet
there are enough reasons to conclude that inequality is not a neutral or indeed a
constructive force in the world. In the absence of overwhelming evidence
reflecting the advantages of gross inequality to the fulfilment of socio-economic
106 See L. Wenar, ‘Human Rights and Equality in the Work of David Miller’ (2008) 11(4) Critical Review of
International Social and Political Philosophy 401, 404-405.
107 H. Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Schocken Books, 1948), 381.
108 ibid, 380.
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Margot Salomon
Why Should it Matter that Others Have More?
and developmental rights in low-income countries, the burden of proof should
shift to those governments, policy-makers and international institutions that allow
for the global inequalities we know today to demonstrate that they are consistent
with the full demands of human rights. International judicial bodies that interpret
the law and hold to account those actors might see the merit in turning their
attention beyond poverty to confront also the inequalities that engender such
widespread malaise and are anathema to the post-war human rights and
development project. A failure to meet the minimum threshold may tell us when a
violation has occurred, but not when an obligation has been fulfilled. Meeting
basic socio-economic rights is of critical importance, but it may not – indeed
cannot, given the features of the contemporary international political economy –
exhaust the scope of obligations in this area.
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